LEAH GARCHIK

Walking east on McAllister on Wednesday, I found myself in a crowd waiting to cross Polk Street, which had been blocked off to allow passage of the funeral procession for Officer Nick-Tomasito Birco. I noticed that one of the two officers controlling the pedestrians was from San Jose; obviously, they were working here to allow Birco's San Francisco colleagues to attend his funeral. The crowd grew as police cars with lights flashing drove south along Polk Street en route from cathedral to cemetery. It was a somber sight, moving reaffirmation of the links among officers from other California communities: Sacramento, Menlo Park, Richmond.

I was on the northwest corner, but when I became aware of a young woman on the southwest corner shouting -- and I thought, with shock, that she was shouting obscenities -- I moved across the street to hear her. She looked to be about 15 years old, and when I got close, I realized she wasn't cursing. Even worse, she seemed to be cheering, as though she was at a Mardi Gras parade. Passing officers had their car windows closed, so I'm not sure they could hear her. But when the stream of cars stopped and the motorcycles started, that changed.

The officers rode by, their faces grim and their eyes straight ahead, and she whooped and hollered as they passed. She was holding a large soft drink, and at one point, while the motorcycles zoomed past the intersection, she screamed something and swung her arm wide at them, and the drink spurted in an arc across the passing convoy. The crowd of pedestrians scattered to avoid the spray, and I was sure an officer would break ranks, screech to a stop and perhaps arrest her. Splattered with soda, no one did. The officers rode on in formal order, their faces stony.

I looked around at the crowd on the sidewalk, trying to catch some fellow pedestrian's eye so as to share my own horror at the woman's assault on the cortege. But there were no words to be shared, or even glances. Everyone on the corner had retreated into a personal cocoon; every eye seemed focused only on the opposite side of the street. No one addressed the young woman; no one -- me, included -- dared express indignation, disapproval.

We looked away and remained silent. For the inconvenienced, the problem of the day was crossing Polk Street.

Shaklee Corp., which is based in Pleasanton, is throwing a big series of events -- meetings and celebrations -- to mark its 50th anniversary this month. The keynote speaker for the main convention event on Aug. 17 will be Nobel Peace Prize winner
Wangari Maathai
. She's an international environmental superstar, and her participation is in gratitude for Shaklee's generosity to her Green Belt Movement. The company already has given her more than $200,000 to plant trees in Kenya ($100,000 plants a million trees there), and I hear the celebration will include an announcement of something more.
Denise Hale
had guests to Cloverdale to lunch with
Crown Prince Alexander
and Crown Princess Katherine of Serbia-Montenegro. They live in Belgrade and are devoted to humanitarian causes, in particular a foundation (lifelineaid.info) for medical aid to Serbia. Hale, beloved by her royal guests for her generosity, has donated several ambulances, and the Crown Prince and Princess were headlining a
Niles Rotary Club
fundraiser for
Kenneth Behring
's
Wheelchair Foundation
. Every $75 donated to the foundation provides a wheelchair.

We sat under the grape arbor as the Crown Princess talked about a lack of incubators and Serbia having one of the highest infant mortality rates in Europe, and then conversation turned to life in the Napa Valley. Several people were looking forward to another lunch at a private winery and wine club, a place where members -- mostly vintners -- study viticulture and exchange information, while enjoying fine wines and food. Membership, it was said, is $150,000.

The next night,
Cynthia Bowman
, a rock chick who began her professional career at
Rolling Stone
and eventually became one of the savviest and toughest public relations pros in the city, threw herself a party to celebrate giving up that career. Bowman was always known as someone with particularly clear vision, and the guts to speak her mind. "It's all bulls -- ," she said of her lifetime of promoting wonderful events involving both meaningful causes and temperamental contributors and organizers. "In the end, it's better to laugh it off."

But Bowman's working days aren't over; she has a plan. After reading Chronicle reporter Kevin Fagan's writings about the homeless, she volunteered at St. Boniface in the Tenderloin, and enrolled to study social work. She's working at the church and attending school. Most recently, this woman famous for being outrageous and nervy has been spending her days cleaning up church pews where the homeless sleep.

Public eavesdropping

Oh, my aching 12-year-old body!"

-- Young girl on cruise to Alaska, trudging up stairs of Holland America's MZ Zuiderdam, Vacation Overheard-12 by Alane Bowling.